The Horatio Stubbs Trilogy (65 page)

I gave her a Chesterfield and struck a match for her. Johnny and I exchanged winks as she lit up, bending over my hand to steady the light, breathing vapour trails through her delicate nostrils. She also managed to rub a tit against my arm.

‘May I siddown wit' you, Horry? Won't you innerduce me your fren'?'

‘Oh, Johnny, this is Miss Katie Chae, she's a friend, and Miss Chae, this is Johnny Mercer, he's a friend of mine.' Despite the ‘friend' business, we had only spoken once because of Margey's jealousy – but in Medan one saw people around and about.

They exchanged greetings. I could tell Johnny was interested.

‘You are from Lonnon, Johnny?' Miss Chae asked him, leaning forward.

‘I'm a Cockney but my home's in Swindon. That's in Wiltshire.'

‘Too bad.' She looked at him under her dark lashes and then leaned back in her chair, blowing out smoke like the very picture of relaxation. Turning towards me and pointing the cigarette, she said, as if hardly asking a question at all, ‘Where's Rosey toni'?'

‘You mean Margey?'

Miss Chae sipped at her cigarette. ‘Some time she Rosey, some time she Margey. Diff'ent trade mark, same goods.'

She flashed beautiful teeth at me, as if unaware of the havoc her remark caused.

Johnny scraped his chair back and stood up, calling for the bill. ‘I better get on up the
RAPWI
– they've got a dance on tonight and all the birds will be booked if I don't hurry. Why don't you come too?'

I was still not looking at Miss Chae. ‘See you tomorrow, Johnny.'

‘You're a big boy now. Just remember the old powder-keg. Night, Miss Chae.' He tipped the boss of the café and went out into the street.

My companion looked after him with disdain. ‘Your fren' he like
Orang Blanda
girl, yes?'

‘Yes.'

‘Yes, I t'ink. He not wait buy Miss Chae drink.
Orang Blanda
girl legs very fat. India girls legs very thin. Only China and Malay girl legs very pretty, yes? You buy me drink, Horry?'

‘I must go. Some other evening. I'd love to.' Saying no played hell with the respiratory system. The effect of having that countenance, with its lustrous eyes, turned upon you, was compelling.

Her conversation was a series of small raids on one's privacy. ‘You been Sumatra long time, Horry. When I speak Malay,
apa mengerti
?'

‘I know that
Orang Blanda
, means the Dutch.'

‘All people hate
Orang Blanda
, no want come back.
Orang Ingris
diff'ent, Ingris men nice, I like. When I say “
saya kaseh angkau
”, can you un'erstan' what I say?'

What she was saying was, ‘I love you'; Margey had taught me that. Feeling my cheeks redden, I rose from my chair, smiling down at her. ‘You're telling me that it's time I went.'

As I put some money down on the table and left, she called, ‘See you, big boy.' The quote to end all quotes from all the Hollywood flicks of the thirties.

As I strolled along to Margey's place, other terrible phrases of Miss Chae's came back. ‘Some time she Rosey, some time she Margey. Diff'ent trade mark, same goods.' Misery.

The soldiers from Amboina were sitting on the doorsteps and window sills of their barracks, singing to their girlfriends songs of Pacific beaches, moonlit nights, love for ever, fornications past, fornications to come, and fornications in progress, caressing the taut sinews of their guitars as they did so. Among all the delectable smells of hitherto unknown cuisines lay the insidious pong of drains, but it
meant only that some gourmet family had just opened a
duryan
, that delicious fruit whose stink can anaesthetise an entire street when the wind is right.

Ah, nights of Medan. At least I had sense enough to relish your mixed pleasures at the time …

Margey's humble home was crowded. Several old men and women, their faces brown and wrinkled like apples stored too long, moved silently about the room. The men were dressed in blue suits, the women in black. One by one, they went behind the old screen to pay their respects to Auntie. From Auntie came only an occasional moan; the curative flying lizard had not done its stuff.

In order to accommodate the visitors, the table had been pushed to one side, under the stairs. There sat Fat in his usual posture, a cigarette balanced in his mouth. With him were two men, one of the brown unidentifiable ones, and the scholarly Tiger Balm, spectacles gleaming. He and Fat nodded politely to me. Of Margey there was no sign.

According to my watches, it was about nine o'clock, give or take twenty minutes. I set down on the table the presents I had brought for Margey: a jar of Chivers' marmalade, a tin of Portuguese sardines, two bars of Palmolive, a tub of Indian-made Andrews' Liver Salts, and some envelopes.

As Fat seized upon these items and examined them with police-force thoroughness, Tiger Balm said affably, ‘And are the British still preparing for withdrawal?'

‘That's up to Soekarno to decide.'

My sarcasm was lost on him. He merely asked, taking another whiff of his cigarette. ‘Is that the official British attitude? Now you allow people to have what they want. We read in the papers that London lets Marshal Tito take over Jugoslavia. Poor King Peter, who was your wartime ally, is left out in the cold.'

That this intellectual Chinaman should know so much about things that were going on in Europe …It was none of his business.

‘I came to talk to Rosey. To Margey. Where is she?'

‘Old Auntie sick,
tida bagoose
,' said Fat. ‘Margey look see Auntie.'

But in a moment, Margey appeared, smiling, and took my hand. I put an arm round her, squeezing her waist.

‘Second house of the cinema in half an hour,' I said. ‘
They All Kissed the Bride.
Joan Crawford. Had you forgotten?'

She laughed in genuine amusement. ‘I forget cinema with you, Horry? Course Margey no forget. First I nurse poor old Auntie a little, then we go. After that, we eat and have fun, yes?' She smiled her lovely smile. ‘And you bring me more presents, you naughty boy. Now what, this time?' Fat yielded up the shopping item by item, retrieving each after she had looked at it.

Her slender arms went round my neck. ‘Why you so kind to me, Horry? Poor Margey no good for you. You very good for Margey.'

‘Not a foreign devil rapist soldier any longer, eh? You're gorgeous, Margey – get a bloody move-on, will you, or we'll miss the best seats.'

‘Maybe I give some Andrews' Liver Salt to poor old Auntie. She very ill. Then we go upstairs for very quick time before pictures, okay? You like it? My God, Horry, I will absolutely drag your trousers down and I will make you come your orgasm in fastest rate ever, so be warn!'

After the film, the hordes poured out along the safely lighted thoroughfares, but Margey led me down various unlit and unsavoury alleyways to an area of the town which had only recently been declared safe, following the eradication of a nest of extremists. This was the busiest time of day, with trade brisk and amazing smells of cooking fighting with music in the air. Not a hint of trouble about – though it needed only one pistol shot for the streets to clear instantly. I had seen it happen.

Margey trotted along happily at my side. ‘This restaurant nice pleasant prace. Once was a consulate building, you
know. Now British have made a deal with Soekarno, you not get shot at any more times.'

I agreed that this was a good thing.

‘When British troops go away, then begins more shooting, and much trouble for all China people. Right now, Indonesians have your people to worry about. When you gone, then they worry about our people, I think.'

‘Something's worrying me. Do you ever call yourself Rosey?'

We walked several paces before she said in a tiny voice, ‘Why you ask such a thing?'

‘Answer the question.'

‘I Margey, okay. That my name ever since I go university. English names very smart and fashionable. Who this Rosey? What you mean to say? I no like all so many questions.' I listened to her working herself up and would not reply.

The restaurant was a two-storey concrete structure, built on stilts overlooking the river. Its name was the
Bunga Rampaian.
Its façade was scarred by machine-gun fire. As we entered, the sight of customers and the prospect of a meal made Margey chirpy again.

She knew the boss. With wide smiles, we were shown to a table. Fragrant odours filled the air. It would be strange when first the British then the Dutch withdrew; but surely the prophets of doom would be wrong and the political takeover prove peaceful, here if not in Java. Probably I could get a bank job; the Indonesian Republic would need banks. If only I could get in touch with bloody Boyer …

While I fantasised, Margey conferred with the waiter.

‘They have very tasty good sea fish served with ginger, also sweet green bean soup. How you like that, darling?'

‘Sounds great. Bring it on.' As we lit cigarettes and smiled at each other, a five-piece band began to assemble on a tiny platform. They started up with ‘
Terang Boelan
' as our fish arrived. Customers applauded the tune with rapture.

With my knowledge of banking, I could rise to manager … Ah, at the time, at the time, it appeared that the future
was simple if only I made up my mind. I did not grasp the fact that I was up against the futility of human relationships.

International affairs met with little understanding in those days. To the crowds who danced in London and other great cities on
VE
Day, celebrating the death of fascism, Evil appeared vanquished. They lit their bonfires and exchanged their kisses under the impression that the world's reserves of hatred were exhausted. In the East, matters appeared in truer perspective.

VE
Day itself was the occasion for a ten-minute break for a smoke while we got on with the task of dislodging every Japanese installed in thousands of islands and territories which stretched from Tokyo to the very gates of India. After the Japanese surrender, their will to fight smashed by the A-bomb, insurrections sprang up on every side in the territories they had freed from white rule.

No country went back into the box from which the Nipponese tide had spilled it. New breeds of angry men arose, running to new barricades waving new banners. Many leaders like Soekarno rode to power on the backs of Nippon. In the East, the one peace ignited a dozen wars.

Even in Medan, time-honoured fuses of economic interest, of race, of faith, of colour, were spluttering away. We kept our weapons clean, dry, and slightly oiled, and listened to ‘
Terang Boelan
'.

While we wolfed down the fish, Margey extracted from me the fact that I had spoken to Katie Chae. Only when I swore that she was the ugliest Chinese girl I had ever seen did Margey relax.

‘Miss Chae is no pure China girl,' she said. ‘That is why she so ugly like you say, and so dark skin. I hear her father is a very bad man who ran away to Penang after a bank robbery. He is half Mongolian man.'

‘What's the other half?'

‘I tell you, Horry, her father one half Chinese, one half Tibet, one half Mongolian. Maybe another half Negro, I
don't know.' She burst out laughing, covering her mouth politely.

‘That makes two of her!'

‘Miss Chae girl of many halves. I not bore you with description of her quarters.' She roared with laughter again, sobering to say, ‘She come from Tibet – not so nice place as Tsingtao. Where you get this Rosey nonsense? One day, how I wish to take you see Tsingtao and the Shantung Peninsula. The people are all good and the landscape so pretty …' She sighed. ‘Now for the present I must go home and nurse poor Auntie a little more.'

I do not remember asking what was the matter with Auntie. She was old, and old people had a habit of falling ill.

‘Don't go yet, Margey. Your place is full of people who can look after Auntie.'

She laughed contemptuously, and waved her fingers. ‘They no capable. They poor fish, except Daisy, and Daisy work too much hard. Auntie
need
me.' She rose, giving me a smile. I saw the enduring woman I admired, who went about her daily business – the shopping, the cleaning, the tending – however thoroughly the world fell apart round her.

As we left the restaurant, a knot of foreigners – Dutch – were pushing their way forward, talking in loud voices.

‘
Orang Blanda!
' said Margey, in low-voiced contempt. As she spoke, I spotted Johnny Mercer in the group. A tall blonde girl, real officer-fodder, had her arm entwined with his. He did not see me, I made no sign, allowing Margey to lead me through the dark alleys.

I gave her a good-night kiss at her door and left her to do her stuff with Auntie. An hour or so before curfew. I took a stroll up the Kesawan, where shops were still open.

Pleasant daydreams filled my mind. I saw the British leaving; the Dutch leaving, the Indonesians allowed to get on with their own business, building the place up again, trading with Singapore and the rest of the world. Why not? The island had coal, oil, minerals, endless timber; anything grew in the marvellous climate. It could become the richest
country on earth. This logical development has yet to take place.

A chill breeze sprang up. Rain was on the way again, moving in across the Indian Ocean. I went into the nearest shop and chatted with the shop-owner, while Malayan music twangled from an ancient radio. The old man apologised for the poverty of his stock. Tomorrow, the
Van Heutsz
would dock in Belawan harbour. It would unload goods for his shop, including Swiss music boxes in cigarette cases, which troops would like.
Van Heutsz
was very fine Dutch ship. In pre-war days he had sailed as far as Celebes on that ship. It was tranquil to be on the sea and watch day break over the waters.